Regions Financial Corp. holds its usual conference call with analysts at 10 a.m. today to discuss quarterly earnings, but there might emerge a subtopic of keener interest to those invested in the Memphis economy, Downtown’s vitality or one of the 950 Memphis jobs at Morgan Keegan.

The big Birmingham-based Regions has not elaborated or explained itself since a cryptic June 20 statement that it hired Goldman Sachs to help explore “strategic alternatives” for the Memphis-based investment bank it owns, Morgan Keegan.

But financial news services have mined anonymous sources for illuminating reports, the latest of which is a Reuters article that names financial investment and private equity firms expected to submit bids for Morgan Keegan by today.

Morgan Keegan could be a good catch, considering ites with 1,200 brokers in its private client group, generated $1.32 billion in gross revenue last year, and just Monday was identified by Thomson Reuters as the nation’s eighth leading underwriter of negotiated municipal bond issues for the first half of this year.

The Reuters article published late last week states interested bidders are:

Blackstone Group LP, a leading investment and financial advisory firm based in New York with 21 offices worldwide.

Carlyle Group, a Washington-based global asset management firm that, among other things, provides investor equity for management-led buy-outs.

Stifel Financial Corp, a St. Louis-based brokerage firm with 314 offices in 44 states.

Raymond James, a diversified financial servicespany with 5,300 financial advisers and $282 billion in client assets.

TPG Capital, a Fort Worth, Texas-based global private investment firm with $48 billion under management.

Apollo Global Management, an alternative asset management firm with $70 billion under management.

Warburg Pincus, a New York-based private equity firm with $35 billion invested in 650panies.

Regions bought Morgan Keegan 10 years ago for $789 million.

The firm’s Downtown tower is Memphis’ most modern skyscraper.

While Memphians may consider the fate of Morgan Keegan to be the biggest angle to today’s conference call, Regions and the analysts monitoring the bank have other important topics to tackle: The bank has not made an annual profit since 2007.

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